Firstly, apologies for absence from the waves of t’interweb. I have no excuse other than being slightly busy, and a bit blind to new thoughts – what a horrible way to start the year! I do have a plan to fill such gaps in 2010 with a short series of memoirs of my life n Rock n Roll, such as it has been. But more of that another time.
Also, half-hearted apologies about the title…but all will make sense soon. If you’re not familiar with the work of Russ Meyer, here’s a synopsis from Wikipedia of ‘Faster Pussycat! Kill, Kill!”
“Three thrill-seeking go-go dancers encounter a young couple in the desert while drag racing. After killing the boyfriend with her bare hands, Varla drugs, binds, gags and kidnaps his girlfriend, Linda. On a desolate highway, the four stop at a gas station, where they see an old man and his muscular, dimwitted son, known as the Vegetable. The gas station attendant tells the women that the old man and his two sons live on a decrepit ranch with a hidden cache of money. Intrigued, Varla hatches a scheme to rob the lecherous old man, who is confined to a wheelchair.”
Go on, rent it. Better still, have a weekend ‘in the style of’. Actually don’t, but it does sound like the sort of thing that we might have aspired to a few years back.
Several years (and a number of children) ago, Mrs Emu and I, together with Mrs Emu’s younger brother, took a convertible hire car from LA to Vegas ‘in the style of’ Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. And a very wonderful time we had as well, at least partly re-enacting the book. For some reason, myself and ME’sYB necked a bottle of tequila and Mr & Mrs T’s Marguerita Mix in the back of the car, accompanying ourselves as Mrs E drove across the desert, with impromptu strains of ‘It’s Marguerita Time’. By Status Quo. At which point our journey & Hunter S Thompson’s started diverging, and the weekend became officially lost.
And nowadays, when I think about taking this sort of trip, my immediate thoughts are:
Can I afford the time off work?
Who will look after the kids?
Will I get arrested?
How can I avoid a hangover?
How will I get enough sleep?
Will I still manage to get a run in every morning?
…all of which feels, let’s face it, a bit middle aged. And I wasn’t planning to get to middle aged, ever. And it gets worse…
I’ve bored readers of this blog before with tales of running and training, and I’m finally realising that I’m really getting on a bit. You will of course, be chorusing ‘Oh no you’re not’ at this point, but sadly, it’s true. I’ve been training up for the joys of the London Marathon in April, and training on the same sort of plan that I’ve been using for about 4-5 years. And, apart from the fact that I struggle a bit more to get out of the door these days, I’ve been doing the same sort of sessions. Irritatingly though, my 1km efforts this evening are about 20 seconds a mile slower than the pace that I ran for a whole marathon in 2004.
It being the London Marathon, my overriding fears are that a) I’ll do an ’embarrassing’ time and b) I’ll be overtaken by someone in fancy dress. Actually, this happened a couple of years ago when I was overtaken in the Mall by the runner going for the Guinness Book of Records entry for ‘Fastest Santa’. Given that his costume consisted of normal running gear with a light red cape over the top, I didn’t think that counted. No, metaphorically looking over my shoulder I can start to see a Rhino approaching.
So the grim reality that I am no longer 26, unable to knock out a training session in the morning, an evening of flaming sambukas and cigarettes in the evening, squeeze in a couple of hours of sleep, then do the same the next day, appears to be hitting home. But it’s not going to stop me from trying….
The Emu 